For what it's worth, I'm genuinely
not frothing at the mouth right now. I'm just a little tired of talking about this. Lately I've gotten into my most light-hearted and ridiculous conversations over on Glocktalk (where I'm supposed to be discussing grown-up stuff like law enforcement's abuse of power, race relations, and firearm ownership) and all kinds of serious discussions over here on Dumpshock (where I'm supposed to talk about stupid game stuff). I resigned myself a long time ago to the idea of my
Libertarian self actually because radically right-wing and
conservative compared to most gamers; it's just something about the hobby, I guess, much like another of my geek passions, comic books. I know I'm the rabid gun-nut right-winger guy around here, or whatever, and hopefully everyone understands I don't necessarily
mean to be.
It's just not in my nature to let things slide (ask the mods). If someone says something I believe to be incorrect, I correct them. If I believe that statement to be incorrect and it rubs me the wrong way, well, I correct them with a bit more vitriol than perhaps I should. Regardless, it's hard for me to
not speak up sometimes. The older I get, the more seriously I take some stuff. Even worse, though, I keep stumbling across these comments that I'm
physically incapable of ignoring while I'm sitting here at work. I'm at work! I should be doing other things, like organizing feedback for Tisoz's latest fiction contest or playing Tetris or maybe doing a little...what's that word? Oh, yeah. Work.
And so, in an effort to wrap up my participation in this particular avenue of discussion (concerning the 2A and what it might mean, should mean, might not mean, can mean, and sometimes does mean, to Americans), I'll just post
this link right here, to dailykos.com, a
really liberal web site that pleasantly surprised me when one of their members posted a blog/journal/essay/whatever called "Why Liberals Should Love The Second Amendment." What surprised me even more were some of the comments -- from dailykos members.
It's a long read. To lots of you it might even be a boring read. But maybe some of you will read it and understand a bit about where I'm coming from, and where lots of other Americans are coming from with our beliefs concerning those few lines of text that cause so much trouble. The initial essay, along with all the comments afterwards, came about wholly independent of "gun companies" (many of which aren't American and yet aren't pushing for Germany, Russia, Austria, or France to get a 2A of their own) and wholly independent of any sort of organized "gun lobby," because I'm willing to bet not many more members of dailykos.com are registered NRA members than, for instance, members of democraticunderground.
Lastly, to those of you of other nationalities who my little rants offend, I don't genuinely
mean to. But when folks lash out at my house, sometimes my reaction is to lash out at theirs. A good chunk of my frustration over the entire conversational topic is that somehow people have got it into their heads that the right to self defense is somehow innately American. I feel that to be patently ridiculous. The right to defend yourself from the physical harm wrought upon you by others of ill intent is innately
human, is innately that of
any living creature, in fact. If someone means you ill and perpetrates an act of violence or invades your home in order to act out that ill will, no matter who you are or where you are from or what the color of your skin, you should be allowed to defend yourself and your family, period. I am saddened, as a human being, every time anyone of any country tries to argue otherwise. Passive resistance is great for political movements. It is no help at all against a junkie looking to kill you for the money in your pockets so he can get his next fix. Nothing disgusts me more than politicians and celebrities, surrounded by armed bodyguards, who try to tell other people they don't have a right to own a weapon or to otherwise defend themselves -- no matter what country those "other people" are from, or what nationality the politician in question might be.
And with all that out of the way, I'd really,
really, like it if we could all get back to talking about imaginary everymen in our imaginary Shadowrun shared future. It's what got me into the thread in the first place, after all. Suffice it to say, as far as a Shadowrun "everyman" and gun ownship goes, I'd say the odds are
against every single average guy on the street packing any sort of heat, nevermind the big and nasty kind that can't be concealed. It's entirely dependant upon where you run into that "everyman," of course, but I'd say maybe one in twelve or fifteen should have some sort of pistol on him. Legality aside, not everyone who
can legally own a gun, even in yippy-kai-aye triggerhappy America,
does. I don't imagine that changing in the future, when Big Brother makes your average SIN-holding wageslave even more "secure" and "comfortable" and "protected" (watched, monitored, and spied on). Megacorps are
all about raising people to rely on the company for protection (along with relying on them for everything else). While firearm ownership might not be illegal, I can still see it being frowned upon by most corporations (with a few exceptions, line Lone Star or Ares, where they enjoy pushing that "gun toting cowboy" feel, and any
actual gun toting cowboys growing up in the company are herded into security positions).